Long-Term Evolution (LTE) is the latest development in wide area cellular mobile network technology. In contrast with the earlier generations of circuit-switched mobile networks, LTE is all-IP packet-switched network. Both voice and data are sent inside IP packets. Voice over IP (VoIP) is used to provide voice service to LTE users. The speech frames are encapsulated into real-time protocol (RTP) packets and sent over the network. The underlying UDP and IP layers prepend their headers to this small RTP packet resulting in a relatively high overhead. The small size of the RTP packets containing voice/audio leads to an overhead problem as the protocol overhead is in addition to the large LTE frame overhead, thus wasting network resources. This master’s thesis project proposes to multiplex RTP and data packets at the user’s device as a solution to reduce the overhead. Moreover, the capability of modern user devices to switch between several interfaces (such as LTE and WLAN), is taken into account and the multiplexing of multiple traffic flows or a single traffic flow are studied in the case of a vertical handover. Performance and cost metrics are used to evaluate different potential demultiplexing points, and then the best possible demultiplexing point is identified. The results of this evaluation show that several demultiplexing points can be used based on the operator’s needs. The increased packet payload size increases the energy efficiency of LTE and may avoid the need of the UE to switch to WLAN to save power. In addition, to ensure high quality of service for VoIP traffic, the simultaneous use of multiple interfaces is efficient if the multiplexer is enabled. The multiplexing solution proposed by this thesis is also fully compatible with any virtual private network encapsulation protocol.

The increased focus on patient safety in hospitals has yielded a flood of new technologies and tools seeking to improve the quality of patient care at the point-of-care. Hospitals are complex institutions by nature, and are constantly challenged to improve the quality of healthcare delivered to patients while trying to reduce the rate of medical errors and improve patient safety. Here a simple mistake such as patient misidentification, specimen misidentification, wrong medication, or wrong blood transfusion can cause the loss of a patient's life. The focus of this paper is the implementation and evaluation of a handheld-based patient identification system that uses radio frequency identification (RFID) and 802.11b wireless networks to identify patients. In this approach, each patient is given a RFID wristband which contains demographic information (patient ID number, patient summary, hospital code) of the patient. A handheld device equipped with 802.11b wireless connectivity and a RFID reader is then used by the medical staff to read the patient's wristband and identify the patient. This work was carried out at the Department of Medical Physics and Bioengineering at the University College Hospital Galway, Ireland and in co-operation with the National University of Ireland, Galway.

The future mobile communication networks are expected to cope with growing local usage patterns especially in dense urban areas at more affordable deployment and operation expenses. Beyond leveraging small cell architectures and advanced radio access technologies; more radio spectrum are expected to be required to achieve the desired techno-economic targets. Therefore, the research activity has been directed towards discussing the benefits and needs for more flexible and local spectrum authorization schemes. This thesis work is meant to be a contribution to this ongoing discussion from a techno-economic perspective.

In chapter three, the engineering value of the different flexible authorization options are evaluated from the perspective of established mobile network operators using the opportunity cost approach. The main results in chapter three indicate the economic incentives to deploy more small cells based on flexible spectrum authorization options are subject to the potential saving in the deployment and operation costs. Nonetheless; high engineering value can be anticipated when the density of small cells is equal or larger than the active mobile subscribers’ density.

While in chapter four, the possible local business models around different flexible authorization options are investigated from the perspective of emerging actors with limited or ’no’ licensed spectrum resources. In this context, dependent or independent local business can be identified according to surrounding spectrum regulations. On possible independent local business models for those emerging actors is to exploit the different flexible spectrum authorization options to provision tailored local mobile services. Other viable dependent local business models rest with the possibility to enter into different cooperation agreements to deploy and operate dedicated local mobile infrastructure on behalf established mobile network operators.

In this paper we consider a comparative analysis of different deployment solutions in terms of total cost of ownership (TCO) and impact of energy efficiency as a cost parameter, i.e. mobile operator's electric bill. Different deployment options for the wireless segment of the network are considered: macro only versus heterogeneous networks with femto cells to support indoor traffic demand. In addition to the wireless segment different technologies for the backhauling segment are also considered: microwave versus fiber (10G-PON). Considering different user traffic intensities in an urban area and different environments such as business and residential areas, the impact of energy consumption on the TCO has been analyzed. The scope of the paper is extended to compare different backhaul technologies considering the annual increase in the traffic demand up to year 2020. The obtained results indicate that the impact of electric bill becomes more significant over the TCO especially after year 2018. Moreover, the heterogeneous deployment strategy utilizing indoor femto-cells achieves significant savings in terms of electric bill and TCO compared to the macro only solution. However, the saving ratio varies according to the adopted backhauling technology.

Mobile operators nowadays tend to deploy dense heterogeneous layers of 3G and 4G networks in outdoor and indoor environments by adding more macrocells and small cells (e.g. microcells, picocells and femtocells) in response to the increasing demand for coverage and capacity. Another main driver and enabler behind this tendency is the phenomenon that around 80% of power consumption in mobile communication networks stems from the radio base stations. This situation makes mobile operators opt for the use of lowpower radio base stations to provide better coverage, capacity and an environmentally-friendly operation. In this paper the interplay between the deployment costs, targeted QoS and power consumptions have been studied considering two deployment options for the provisioning of the required mobile broadband coverage and capacity; namely the heterogeneous network (HetNet) option versus the homogenous macrocell deployment option. The main findings indicate that, the perceived saving in the total cost of ownership (TCO) resulting from offloading percentage of network traffic to indoor smallcell, in the case of HetNet, is bounded by the mobile subscriber density per area, their usage patterns, the adopted backhaul solution and the used spectrum resources. In general, a quite paying cost and power saving can be achieved by the heterogonous deployment solution for scenarios with high demand levels especially when there is a need to use the spectrum resources more efficiently.

The deployment of low cost and low power base stations has been recognized in recent years as a promising cost-efficient solution and energy-efficient strategy. In this paper the femtocell and macrocell deployment options have been compared in the context of indoor mobile broadband deployment, with focus on the effect of different backhauling solutions in power consumption and the total deployment cost. This study has been based on the deployment of mobile broadband services within an area of one square kilometers in a new densely populated business district where the different user demands, spectrum bandwidths, backhaul technologies and radio access technologies are taken into account. Moreover, various deployment scenarios reflecting the business perspectives of mobile operators have been looked into as well. The main findings reached indicate that backhaul solutions contribute differently to cost and power consumption depending on the employed deployment strategy. However, contributions to the total power consumption and to the CapEx and OpEx elements of the total deployment cost elements turned to be more significant in the case of femtocell deployment scenarios than in the case of macrocell ones. It is worthy of notice that the femtocell deployment is more cost-efficient, especially in high demand situation when new macro sites are needed to be deployed.

The investments in indoor mobile networks are highly related to the spectrum availability and its associated authorization options. The aim of this paper is to discuss the differences in the spectrum demand taking into consideration both wide and local area network deployment requirements and the kind of actor that provides the indoor wireless access. The analysis covers different authorizations options namely licensed, unlicensed, licensed shared access (LSA) and secondary access. A quantitative approach is used to analyze the differences between macrocell and femtocell deployments focusing on deployment cost and spectrum demand. This is complemented by a qualitative study to explore and discuss the strategic business decisions of different actors in view of the available spectrum bands and spectrum authorization options. The main conclusions from this study are; spectrum has more value in macrocell deployment scenarios than in femtocell ones. More spectrum in macrocell deployment scenarios means that operators can deploy less number of new sites and exploit previous infrastructure investments. Femtocell networks are often coverage limited which allows for frequency re-use. As a consequence, the value of spectrum is not the same for mobile network operators (MNOs) and for local network operator (LNOs). MNOs are traditionally confined to macrocell deployment strategies which entail the exclusive usage of licensed bands. While, the use of licensed spectrum by LNOs may incur more cost than the cost of infrastructure deployment. This explains why the use of unlicensed bands is lucrative and viable for LNOs. Furthermore, the LSA scheme may or could soon become an enabler for LNO's business due to the prevailing technical, regulation and policies developments.

The regulatory landscape is changing towards more flexible spectrum management schemes. Such schemes are expected to make additional spectrum resources available and lower the spectrum access barriers. Emerging spectrum authorization schemes such as secondary access (TV White Space) and Licensed Shared Access (LSA) are expected to open doors for new actors rather than traditional MNOs to access licensed spectrum resources at reasonable costs. These schemes will allow actors such as Facility Owners (FO), Mobile Virtual Network Operators (MVNO) and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to invest in indoor mobile network infrastructure. These actors can act as Local Network Operators (LNO) and build their business models around provisioning of mobile services in locations where there seems to be a hole or lack of service coverage in a particular area within the mobile network operators (MNOs) service footprint. This paper highlights the differences between indoor deployment and outdoor deployment in the light of the available spectrum bands to be used and the possible business models for MNOs and LNOs. In short, the possible investment strategies for provisioning indoor mobile services vary between MNOs and LNOs cases due to economic and regulatory aspects surrounding them. The main finding in this study indicates that the willingness of MNOs to invest in dedicated indoor solutions is driven by the balance between the potential revenues and the deployment cost. Moreover MNOs have more spectrum and investment options compared to LNOs who must bond their investment strategies to the available spectrum resources (i.e. the regulations of spectrum access).

The Broadcasting sector has been evolved in terms of service production, transmission platform and reception devices in the last few decades. In contrast to cable and satellite platform, which are suitable for fixed reception only, the terrestrial digital platform can support portable, mobile and fixed reception scenarios. In general, there are two options of mobile multimedia service; one is based on a mobile communication network with IP cast known as MBMS (Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Services), while the other is based on broadcast technology. In the context of convergence, the players in the mobile sector argues that unlike traditional mobile network systems, where the use was restricted to a given application, emerging mobile networks will be able to carry a variety of services and accordingly separate broadcasting networks will no longer be required. In line with argument, it is not economically viable to roll out dedicated wireless broadband networks by the broadcasters to meet the increasing demand for interactive broadcasting services. That is why the broadcasters may look for innovative mechanism to deliver the broadcast services over mobile broadband network owned by the telecommunication operators.

The focus on this paper is to investigate the incentives and challenges for such trend in developing countries; taking Sudan as case study. The main conclusion in this paper indicate that a potential economic incentive for delivering the broadcasting service over cellular network in Sudan subject to the deployment of high efficient mobile network. Moreover, the mobile operators may consider support such approach considering the increase demand for additional frequency resource. However, the key challenges remain in how to develop a suitable regulations landscape to assure fair and competitive business practices on hand while guaranteeing the continuation of the public broadcasting service. In this regard, a new regulation framework needs to be developed to separate the three key functions in digital terrestrial broadcasting value chain (namely the content production and distribution). Further on, the necessary interconnection regulations need to put on place in order to pave the way for rollout of common platform that are necessary for interactive and nonlinear services.

Mobile operators nowadays tend to deploy dense heterogeneous layers of 3G and 4G networks in outdoor and indoor environments by adding more macrocells and smallcells (e.g. microcells, picocells and femtocells) in response to the increasing subscriber demand for coverage and capacity. The main driver and enabler behind this tendency is the phenomenon that around 80% of power consumption in mobile communication networks stems from the radio base stations. This situation makes mobile operators opt for the use low-power radio base stations to provide better coverage, capacity and a more environment-friendly operation. The use of low-power radio base stations leads to reduction of energy consumption in mobile communication networks power. The aim of this study is to conduct a comparative study between homogenous macrocell deployment and indoor smallcell deployments as alternative solutions for provision of the required indoor coverage and capacity. Moreover, the study highlights the importance of backhaul solutions being critical components in the smallcell network deployment. Furthermore, the scope of the study is extended to cover the investigation of the value of the heterogeneous (i.e. hybrid marcocell-femtocell) deployment scenario as a cost and power-efficient solution versus the homogenous marcocell deployment scenario in view of the variations in the mobile network traffic during the day. The main findings indicate that the CapEx and OpEx of the backhaul solution represent the major part of the total deployment cost in the indoor smallcell deployment scenario (i.e. femtocell case) compared to those of the macrocell deployment scenario. Nonetheless, the perceived saving in the total cost of ownership (TCO) resulting from the use of indoor smallcell (i.e. femtocell) remains a satisfactory and convenient motivation considering the traffic variation across the day, traffic distribution between indoor and outdoor locations and the keenness to use the spectrum resources more efficiently.

the continuing growth in the mobile data traffic magnifies the challenges for the design and deployment of scalable high-capacity mobile networks that can meet the future demand at reasonable cost levels. In order to meet the future traffic demand, an operator should invest on both infrastructure, i.e. densification of base stations, and more radio spectrum. Knowing the effectiveness of each element is thus of utmost importance for minimizing the investment cost. In this paper, we study the economic substitutability between spectrum and densification. For this, we measure the engineering value of spectrum, which refers to the potential saving in the total cost of ownership (TCO) as result of acquiring additional spectrum resources. Two countries are considered to represent different market situations: India with dense population and high spectrum price and Sweden with moderate population density and low spectrum fee. Numerical results indicate that additional amount of spectrum substantially relieves the need for densifying radio base stations, particularly for providing high user data rate in dense India. Nonetheless, the engineering value of spectrum is low in India (i.e. spectrum acquisition has less cost benefit) under the high spectrum price of today, whereas spectrum is instrumental in lowering the total cost of ownership in Sweden. Our finding highlights the importance of affordable and sufficient spectrum resources for future mobile broadband provisioning.

Maximizing connection availability in WDM networks is critical because even small disruptions can cause huge data losses. However, there is a trade-off between the level of network survivability and the cost related to the backup resources to be provided. The 100% survivability can be achieved by dedicated path protection with multiple pre-reserved protection paths for each provisioned connection, i.e., DPP (1:N). Unfortunately, the blocking probability performance of DPP (1:N) is negatively affected by the large number of pre-reserved backup wavelengths standing-by unutilized. On the other hand, path restoration (PR)-based solutions ensure good blocking performance at the expense of lower connection availability.

The work in this paper aims at finding hybrid network survivability strategies that combine the benefits of both techniques (i.e., high availability with low blocking rate). More specifically, the paper focuses on a double link failure scenario and proposes two strategies. The first one, couples dedicated path protection DPP (1:1) with path restoration (referred to as DPP + PR) to minimize the number of dropped connections. The second scheme adds up the concept of backup reprovisioning (BR), referred to as DPP + BR + PR, in order to further increase the connection availability achieved by DPP + PR. Integer Linear Programming (ILP) models for the implementation of the proposed schemes are formulated. Extensive performance evaluation conducted in a PCE-based WDM network scenario shows that DPP + BR + PR and DPP + PR can significantly lower the blocking probability value compared to DPP (1:2) without compromising too much in terms of connection availability.

The inevitable deployment of 5G and the Internetof-Things (IoT) sheds the light on the importance of the energy efficiency(EE) performance of Device-to-Device (DD) communicationsystems. In this work, we address a potential IoT application,where different prioritized DD system, i.e., Low-Priority (LP) andHigh-Priority (HP) systems, co-exist and share the spectrum. Wemaximize the EE of each system by proposing two schemes. Thefirst scheme optimizes the individual transmission power andthe spatial density of each system. The second scheme optimizesthe transmission power ratio of both systems and the spatialdensity of each one. We also construct and analytically solve amulti-objective optimization problem that combines and jointlymaximizes both HP and LP EE performance. Unique structuresof the addressed problems are verified. Via numerical results weshow that the system which dominates the overall EE (combinedEEs of both HP and LP) is the system corresponding to the lowestpower for low/high power ratio (between HP and LP systems).However, if the power ratio is close to one, the dominating EEcorresponds to the system with higher weight.

Providing passenger internet on board trains with continuous connectivity at high speeds and over large rural distances is a challenging issue. A frequently used solution to the problem is to use an on board WiFi network connected to the 3G or 4G networks deployed outside the train. In order to be able to provide the capacity and the data rates that tomorrow's business travelers are expecting it has been suggested to use a combination of MIMO and carrier aggregation in the LTE-Advance standard. In this study, we practically investigate the plausibility of using MIMO functionality in an 900 LTE system when the receive antennas are mounted at a train roof about 4m above ground and the base stations antennas are on average placed 2.3km away from the track in towers with an average height of 45m and, hence, most of the time in line of site. It is found that along our test route MIMO is in practice supported by the radio channel at around 70% of the time when the train is travelling with an average speed of 185km/h and the MIMO antennas are mounted 10.5m apart.

Providing broadband passenger internet on board trains with continuous connectivity at high speeds and over large rural distances is a challenging issue. One solution to the problem is to use an onboard WiFi network connected to multiple 3G and 4G networks deployed outside the train and aggregate their combined capacity at the IP protocol level. In order to be able to provide the capacity and the data rates that tomorrow’s travelers are expecting, the future 4G standard (LTE-Advance) uses a combination of high order MIMO and carrier aggregation. In this study we use the Swedish company Icomera’s passenger internet system for our investigation. The system provides aggregation of multiple carrier and handover on an IP level. For about 10 years the system has in Sweden primarily been using multiple 3G communication links. However, here we present analysis and onboard measurements of a 2×2 MIMO channel to fast moving train in a live LTE 900 network. The results indicate that MIMO works surprisingly well and it is discussed that by combining 8×8 MIMO with carrier aggregation in future releases of 4G, it may be possible to bring gigabit internet connections to trains.

This project began with a microprocessor platform developed by two master’s students: Albert López and Francisco Javier Sánchez. Their platform was designed as a gateway for sensing devices operating in the 868 MHz band. The platform consists of a Texas Instruments MSP430F5437A microcontroller and a Microchip ENC28J60 Ethernet cont roller connected to the MSP430 processor by a Serial Peripheral Interface.

Javier Lara Peinado implemented prototype white space sensors using the platform developed by the earlier two students. As part of his effort, he partially implemented a Trivial File Transfer Protocol (TFTP) system for loading programs in to the flash memory of the microcontroller using Microchip’s TCP/IP stack. However, he was not successful in loading programs into the flash as the TFTP transfer got stuck at the first block.

The first purpose of this project was to find and fix the error(s) in the TFTP loading of programs into the MSP430’s flash memory. The second purpose of this project was to evaluate Microchip’s TCP/IP stack in depth. This report describes measurements of UDP transmission rates. Additionally, the TFTP processing rate is measured and the TFTP program loading code is documented. The report concludes with suggestions for possible improvements of this system.

Cloud computing is a new buzzword in the modern information technology world. Today cloud computing can be considered as a service, similar to the way that electricity is considered a service in urban areas. A cloud user can utilize different computing resources (e.g. network, storage, software application), whenever required, without being concerned with the complex underlying technology and infrastructure architecture. The most important feature is that the computing resources are available whenever they are needed. Additionally, users pay only for the resource they actually use. As a result, cloud users can easily scale their information technology infrastructure, based on their business policy and requirements. This scalability makes the business process more agile.

The motivation for this thesis was the need for a suitable set of security guidelines for ifoodbag (and similar companies) when implementing web applications in the cloud. The goal of this thesis is to provide security in a system, being developed in another Master’s thesis project, to implement the ifoodbag web application in a cloud. To achieve this goal, we began by identifying the risks, threats, and vulnerabilities in the system model proposed by these other students for their implementation. A study was made of several different security mechanisms that might reduce or eliminate risks and secure the most vulnerable points in the proposed system’s design. Tests of these alternatives were conducted to select a set of mechanisms that could be applied to the proposed system’s design. Justification for why these specific mechanisms were selected is given. The tests allowed the evaluation of how each of these different security mechanisms affected the performance of the system. This thesis presents the test results and their analysis. From this analysis a set of mechanisms were identified that should be included in the prototype of the system. In conclusion, we found that DNSSEC, HTTPS, VPN, AES, Memcached with SASL authentication, and elliptic curve cryptography gave the most security, while minimizing the negative impact on the system. Additionally, client & server mutual authentication and a multi-level distributed database security policy were essential to provide the expected security and privacy that users would expect under the Swedish Data Protection law and other laws and regulations.

Online social networks have become a fast and efficient way of sharing information and experiences. Over the past few years the trend of using social networks has drastically increased with an enormous amount of users’ private contents injected into the providers’ data centers. This has raised concerns about how the users’ contents are protected and how the privacy of users is preserved by the service providers. Moreover, current social networks have been subject to much criticism over their privacy settings and access control mechanism. The providers own the users’ contents and these contents are subject to potential misuse. Many socially engineered attacks have exposed user contents due to the lack of sufficient privacy and access control. These security and privacy threats are addressed by Project Safebook, a distributed peer-to-peer online social networking solution leveraging real life trust. By design Safebook decentralizes data storage and thus the control over user content is no longer in the service provider’s hands. Moreover, Safebook uses an anonymous routing technique to ensure communication privacy between different users.

This thesis project addresses privacy aware data management for Safebook users and a data access control solution to preserve users’ data privacy and visibility utilizing a peer to peer paradigm. The solution focuses on three sub-problems: (1) preserving the user’s ownership of user data, (2) providing an access control scheme which supports fine grained access rights, and (3) secure key management. In our proposed system, the user profile is defined over a collection of small data artifacts. An artifact is the smallest logical entity of a profile. An artifact could be a user’s status tweak, text comment, photo album metadata, or multimedia contents. These artifacts are then logically arranged to form a hierarchical tree, call the User Profile Hierarchy. The root of the profile hierarchy is the only entry point exposed by Safebook from where the complete user profile can be traversed. The visibility of portions of the user profile can be defined by exposing a subset of profile hierarchy. This requires limiting access to child artifacts, by encrypting the connectivity information with specific access keys. Each artifact is associated with a dynamic access chain, which is an encrypted string and contains the information regarding the child nodes. A dynamic access chain is generated using a stream cipher, where each child’s unique identifier is encrypted with its specific access key and concatenated to form the dynamic access chain. The decryption process will reveal only those child artifacts whose access keys are shared. The access keys are managed in a hierarchical manner over the profile hierarchy. Child artifacts inherit the parent’s access key or their access key can be overridden with a new key. In this way, fine grained access rights can be achieved over a user’s artifacts. Remote users can detect changes in a specific branch of a profile hierarchy and fetch new artifacts through our proposed profile hierarchy update service. On top of the proposed access control scheme, any social networking abstraction (such as groups, circles, badges, etc.) can be easily implemented.

Currently, Android is the most popular operating system for mobile devices, but at the same time, the market for Android devices is heavily fragmented in terms of available versions, types of devices, models, form-factors and manufactures. As a result, it is virtually impossible to test applications on all existing devices. Testing on a set of the most popular devices is more realistic but can be expensive, which makes it much more difficult for individual developers to create high quality applications.

Fortunately, each Android application developer around the world typically owns at least one device which is not used all the time and could be shared with other developers. This way, a community shared pool of Android devices can be created for automated test execution.

This master thesis reviews existing testing frameworks that are used for testing Android applications and analyzes existing services that in one way or another try to solve the problem of providing affordable ways of performing testing on real devices. Main result of this thesis project is a working distributed community based testing service that enables developers to easily connect, share, and execute automated test cases on devices that use Android operating system. Moreover, it provides ways of decreasing overall test execution time by executing parts of tests in parallel on multiple devices and aggregating received results.

During recent years, there has been an increasing interest in the potential opportunities that can be attained with the use of smart devices in order to gather data or automate processes. This type of communications between devices with minimal human intervention is referred to as Machine-to-machine (M2M) communications that can be applied to optimize resources and improve service delivery applications. Smart Grid is one of the M2M communications applications that is attaining more attention during recent years, because of its potential to change the complete energy ecosystem; going from a unidirectional system to a bidirectional one where customers will have an important role in the ecosystem.Depending on the country and its characteristics and situation, Smart Grid development can be very different. This article identifies commonalities and differences in Smart Grid communication development considering the current status in developed and developing countries. The process is done by evaluating the following techno-economic aspects: Technology development, Public initiatives, Regulator policies and Economic situation/Business perspective of the country. The article is concluded by showing that regulator policies regarding the level of liberalization in the energy market are a key element when defining business strategies and different stages of Smart Grid communications development has a critical influence in the definition of business models, as it defines the key activities, partners and value proposition for the business.

During the recent years several technologies and services based in Internet of Things (IoT) and Machine-to-Machine communications (M2M) have appeared in many different sectors, like healthcare, transport, logistics, media or utilities. When new technologies (like Smart Grid or Smart Energy) appear two types of challenges can be defined: technical and business challenges, therefore innovation has to be applied in both of them. Too often innovation is focus on the technical evolution and underestimated on the business field, however it is a key aspect for new technologies and services to reach commercial success. Traditional business models in the energy sector will suffer big changes in the next years, as the Smart Grid concept is developed.By the advent of new services and applications, horizontal and vertical partnerships with competitors and other actors will take place. In this context collaboration between actors, partnerships and agreements will be of key importance. This paper investigates the different actors involved in a Smart Energy ecosystem, its possible activities and suitable business models for the different Smart Grid building blocks or milestones.

Energy optimization in cellular networks has been studied using different perspectives in the literature: sleep patterns, network interference, association of users and base stations, resource allocation of resources (bandwidth and power), etc. All these means have been discussed individually in previous works. However, none of the existing works has succeeded in proposing an exact mathematical model that takes into account several of these parameters simultaneously. In this article, we propose a first exact modelling of several network parameters and their interaction in order to minimize the energy consumption in a LTE cellular network. The optimization model guarantees to satisfy all the users with a minimum quality of service (data rate). Its exact solution allows energy savings of up to 50% in a moderately loaded network, which leads to energy savings up to twice that of the heuristic proposed by Piunti et al., (2015). Various numerical results are presented on hexagonal and randomly generated cellular networks.

A mobile payment can be performed in various ways. For example, the Near Field Technology (NFC) integrated with mobile devices provides an opportunity of a contactless mobile payment. However, it is not only payment. The NFC can further expand functionality of mobile phones and enrich consumer experience. Indeed, added value services created by the NFC include mobile ticketing, loyalty applications, smart advertisement, informational service, physical and logical access, and other functionalities.

However, despite NFC potential to create added value we cannot witness its wide penetration and global spread unless some successful solutions are implemented on a national level. The research aims to define the barriers preventing NFC pilots from entering commercialization stage in Western Europe.Commercialization of NFC mobile solutions needs to overcome a range of barriers and obstacles predefined by macro- and micro-environmental conditions, and individual factors related to consumers, which are analized in this research.

Mobile payment services are expected to be the next step of the electronic payment evolution. However, the level of penetration in European countries is lower than expected. The focus of most academic research has been in two main areas: (i) mobile payment adoption by consumers and (ii) technical aspects of the service. Consequently, a number of themes remain under-researched. In order to expand knowledge on reasons that affect the wider penetration of mobile payments, challenges related to the introduction of mobile payment services in the market have been explored in this thesis.

More specifically, this research has addressed two problem areas: (i) why mobile payments have not been widely adopted by merchants; and (ii) what effects that the introduction of mobile payments has had on the business networks of the involved actors. As an example, we use the mobile payment services applied in the Swedish retail industry. The study is focused on the main groups of stakeholders – the mobile payment providers, the retailers, and the consumers.

First, this study has helped to identify what different stakeholders expect of mobile payments and how these services correspond to their needs. In order to analyse the expectations of stakeholders, we have developed an analysis framework based on the theory of diffusion of innovations, the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), and the theory of network externalities. The analysis highlights the expectations of stakeholders and helps to understand what kind of mobile payment service merchants expect and are willing to adopt. One key finding is that existing mobile payment services for retailing could be further improved in order to ensure an enhanced purchasing process for consumers.

Second, the research has explored the impact of mobile payment services on the business networks. In order to analyse the relationships and cooperation between business actors, and changes in business strategy and network structure, we used the approach proposed by the Industrial Marketing and Purchasing (IMP) Group. The performed analysis illustrates the following changes in the structure of business networks for the traditional payment solutions (bank cards): (i) emergence of new business actors (i.e. independent mobile payment providers); (ii) new roles and activities of business actors; and (iii) exclusion of traditional business actors (i.e. banks) from the mobile payment systems.

All these changes lead to increased complexity of relationships and increased level of interdependence between business actors within the networks. The following changes in the strategies of involved actors have been identified: (i) mobile payment providers seek to achieve a control over the business network; (ii) the retailers affect strategies of the mobile payment providers; (iii) the marketing strategies of business actors include cross-marketing in different sectors. All these changes result in additional value and enhanced quality of service for consumers.

In order to analyse a complex and multidisciplinary area such as mobile payments, it is beneficial to use more than one analysis approach. A combination of different complementing methods helps to explore different aspects of the phenomenon and provides a more comprehensive overview of several research aspects.

This work contributes to the academic research of mobile payment service adoption by merchants through proposing a theoretical analysis framework. More specifically, the research addresses a new area – expectations of retailers when new solutions are introduced. The framework consists of the following criteria and aspects: technological feasibility, economic benefits, lower service costs, added value of services, network externalities and the problem of critical mass, and finally, ease of use. This framework helps to identify what merchants can expect of mobile payment services.

Another area of contribution is the analysis of the effect that mobile payments make on the actors and business networks of traditional payment services. The introduction of new services results in emergence of new business actors, a need to establish new relationships, and increased complexity of a business network. Moreover, in order to succeed, cooperation between all network actors is needed. As a result, business actors have to adjust their services and strategies according to needs of others.

The NFC technology implemented on the base of contemporary mobile handsets can provide considerable benefits to end-users. However, despite high level of diffusion of mobile phones in Western Europe, the level of penetration of the NFC based mobile payment is low. A considerable number of trials have been initiated, however, large scale deployment of commercial NFC services cannot be seen. This paper identifies and analyzes different factors that influence the slow rate of penetration of NFC based mobile payment in Western Europe.

This paper presents a qualitative study based on experience of six NFC pilots implemented in Finland, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, and the UK. The research findings confirm that a number of demand and supply barriers negatively affect the rate of the penetration of the NFC payment. The network externalities and the lack of consumer awareness about NFC services were identified as the most important demand side barriers. The most significant supply side barriers are the lack of uniform technological standards, the lack of NFC enabled mobile phones, and the coopetition issue. In addition, the interrelation between mentioned obstacles was identified. This fact means that a delay in the NFC payment’s diffusion is affected not by a single factor, but rather by a set of interrelated factors. The sources of these obstacles are related to the consumer acceptance, the specifics of business environment, and the technology.

The main objective of the ongoing study is to investigate obstacles ans driving forces affecting organization adoption of innovation. In order to that an example of the mobile payments applied in the Swedish retail industry has been used. The main analyzed factors are: adopter characteristics, supplier marketing activity, perceived innovation dcharacteristics, social network, and environmental influences.

The analysis of case study findings helped to estimate some common trends in the adoption of mobile payment services by retailers. As a result, the analyzed factors were categorized as obstacles or driving forces to adoption of the mobile payments.

The main objective of the ongoing research is to investigate obstacles and driving forces affecting merchants’ decision to invest in mobile payment solutions. The core aim of this paper is to present initial results of a desktop analysis revealing the current market situation, identifying main players, and estimating the structure of investment costs. In order to do that available secondary information was analyzed.

The conducted analysis served to identify market fragmentation existing in the Swedish market due to existence of a number of competing mobile payment solutions. Another finding allows making conclusion, that retailers select to adopt already existing solutions, rather than developing own. Finally, the size of an organization and financial resources are important when making a decision to invest in a new payment solution.

One of the main application areas of mobile payment services in Sweden is retailing. The main stakeholders involved in this service are mobile payment service providers, banks, merchants, and consumers. The main focus of this paper is on the change of expectations of different stakeholders taking part in service provisioning. Analysis has been performed by comparison of the initial expectations before the introduction of a mobile payment service and expectations after practical experience of the service usage. Three cases of mobile payment solutions for retailing have been investigated: BART provided by Swedbank, SEQR provided by Seamless, and a service provided by Payair.

The analysis indicates that a number of expectations of stakeholders about mobile payment services did not come true. The results for the different cases differ but the main findings are: banks were excluded from direct service provisioning; merchants see some advantaged to deploy mobile payment, but are uncertain which solution will be a dominant in the market; consumer expectations of improved purchasing experience and usefulness are not met. The performed analysis also helps to identify some of the reasons that can be seen as obstacles for a wider penetration of mobile payment services.

The case is written for master level students from business, commerce, and technical areas having some background in strategic marketing and management. The work over case implies a group work and a discussion of a strategy behind taken decision.

THE OBJECTIVES OF THE CASE

The main objective of the case is to gain practical skills in and better understanding of decision making in the circumstances of market uncertainty. The decision making process requires analysis of company’s core competences (Collis and Montgomery, 2008), market forces (Porter, 1996; Porter, 2008), and understanding of consumer needs. Students should apply different analysis frameworks in order to develop a strategy improving company’s competitive advantage and leveraging opportunities provided by a new technology, namely a new mobile payment solution. In addition, a consumer-centered thinking should lead to a suggestion of a bundle of attractive added values services build on top of mobile payment solution.

Swedish public transport organizations have set an objective to double usage of the public transport during the next coming five years. This study attempts to investigate if the current ticket solutions support the goal of the public transport companies, and if the available mobile phone solutions can lower barriers for consumers. In order to do that, critical travelling moments for users of different market segments were estimated during a pre-study stage. The following focus group discussions helped to validate problems identified during the pre-study. At the same time, focus groups provided deeper consumer insights on general consumer perception of the transport service, ticketing, mobile payment, quality of service, consumer expectations related to the public transport services, and consumer satisfaction and loyalty.

The conducted research helped to identify problems existing in public transport ticketing and mobile payment areas, which have the negative impact on the usage of the public transport service and contribute with additional barriers for users. Moreover, this conclusion is supported by multiple examples that clearly illustrate what does not work, and why it does not work. Hence, mentioned solutions do not support the overall objective of the public transport operators. The comprehension of these problems and barriers can contribute to a better understanding of consumer needs and expectations, and help the public transport service providers to improve the service.

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to explore the reasons behind the slow adoption of mobile payment services. The expectations of the main groups of stakeholders – the mobile service providers, the retailers, and the consumers – of the service in the retail industry in Sweden are examined. Design/methodology/approach– The authors use a qualitative case study of stakeholders’ expectations. The conceptual research framework is based on the theory of diffusion of innovations, the technology adoption model, and network externalities. The proposed framework was tested and validated by empirical findings. Findings– One of the key findings of the research highlights that acceptance of a mobile payment service depends on the ability of mobile payment providers to build networks of both retailers and consumers simultaneously. The service will attract these stakeholders if it meets their expectations in the best possible way. Another finding is that mobile payment services do not meet expectations on an enhanced purchasing process. This is the area for future service improvement. Research limitations/implications– The main limitation of this study is that only a few retailers were contacted. Practical implications– First of all, criteria from the developed research framework can be used as a guide for mobile payment service development. Second, when developing and providing a mobile payment service, mobile payment providers need to have a good understanding of the needs and expectations of retailers and consumers. Originality/value– Stakeholders’ expectations have not been a focus for research in previous studies. This is a new research object.

One of the main areas of mobile payment application in Sweden is mobile public transport ticketing. The main stakeholders involved in this service are mobile network operators, mobile payment service providers, SMS ticket’s “technology solution” providers, public transport companies, and consumers.

Traditionally, mobile operators have had a strong position in this niche since the mobile phone bill or pre-paid subscriptions were used for end-user billing. Due to financial regulation, this situation was changed in February 2013 when new SMS payment solutions were introduced for all public transport companies in Sweden. A number of new actors entered the scene, and the position of existing actors changed dramatically. At the same time, the Swedish mobile operators formed a joint venture, 4T Sweden, offering a new mobile payment solution – WyWallet.

The main focus of this paper is on the change of expectations of different stakeholders taking part in provisioning of SMS payment services. Analysis has been performed by comparison of the initial expectations before the introduction of the new SMS payment system and the real outcome in approximately half a year time. Analysis revealed the fact that expectations of a number of stakeholders about mobile payment services did not come true. Moreover, due to barriers set by the mobile payment solution, mobile payment transactions in public transportation is dramatically lower than what SMS payments were before the market changed.

Smart environments, particularly smart homes have become an increasingly popular topic for research and real world implementations. Despite the popularity of this topic, there is a lack of tools to enable inhabitants of smart environments to perceive which kind of data smart devices generate and to make inhabitants aware of who is accessing their personal information and the purpose for accessing this information. These issues have caused privacy concerns among inhabitants of smart environments – who would like to ensure their personal information is only utilized for their benefits, rather than being used for malicious purposes. Therefore, smart home environments motivate the need for privacy awareness tools to help inhabitants to better understand the privacy implications when their personal information is misused. To address this problem, this thesis suggests guidelines for the design of privacy awareness tools.

A literature review evaluated instruments to conduct research about privacy concerns. The Internet Users’ Information Privacy Concerns (IUIPC) framework from Malhotra, Kim, and Agarwal was selected for the empirical part of this thesis project because it is one of the most reliable models developed to measure privacy concerns at the individual level. Quantitative data was gathered through a survey based on this framework. Data collected from 30 experts in the field of study was analyzed using linear regression analysis techniques and principal component analysis.

These survey results lead to a set of guidelines that could guide designers and service providers as to what aspects of privacy concerns they should consider and what they should concentrate on when designing privacy awareness tools for ubiquitous computing systems, such as a smart home.

The traffic demand in future mobile cellular networks is expected to increase exponentially which would lead to dense base station deployment and eventually higher energy consumption. The current dominant mobile systems including GSM and UMTS were not designed with focus on energy efficiency. This paper investigates the energy saving potential of pico nodes in a heterogeneous network from an incumbent operator consideration. The results show that the number of hotspots and the user distribution in the hotspots strongly effects the power saving. Also, sleep modes in pico base stations have shown to reduce the energy loss to almost half. On a day average with limited utilization of pico base station, the heterogeneous network scenario provides marginal saving. The results also show that if the pico base station resources are fully utilized, premium user case, the heterogeneous network scenario can provide substantial reduction in energy per bit.

In this paper, energy-efficient scheduling for grouped machine-type devices deployed in cellular networks isinvestigated. We introduce a scheduling-based cooperation incentivescheme which enables machine nodes to organize themselveslocally, create machine groups, and communicate through grouprepresentatives to the base station. This scheme benefits from anovel scheduler design which takes into account the cooperationlevel of each node, reimburses the extra energy consumptionsof group representatives, and maximizes the network lifetime.As reusing cellular uplink resources for communications insidethe groups degrades the Quality of Service (QoS) of theprimary users, analytical results are provided which present atradeoff between maximum allowable number of simultaneouslyactive machine groups in a given cell and QoS of the primaryusers. Furthermore, we extend our derived solutions for theexisting cellular networks, propose a cooperation-incentive LTEscheduler, and present our simulation results in the context ofLTE. The simulation results show that the proposed solutionssignificantly prolong the network lifetime. Also, it is shown thatunder certain circumstances, reusing uplink resource by machinedevices can degrade the outage performance of the primary userssignificantly, and hence, coexistence management of machinedevices and cellular users is of paramount importance for nextgenerations of cellular networks in order to enable group-basedmachine-type communications while guaranteeing QoS for theprimary users.

Fundamental tradeoffs in green cellular networkswith coexistence of machine-oriented and human-oriented trafficsare investigated. First, we present a queuing system to modelthe uplink transmission of a green base station which servestwo types of distinct traffics with strict requirements on delayand battery lifetime. Then, the energy-lifetime and energydelaytradeoffs are introduced, and closed-form expressions forenergy consumption of the base station, average experienceddelay in data transmission, and expected battery lifetime ofmachine devices are derived. Furthermore, we extend the derivedresults to the multi-cell scenario, and investigate the impacts ofsystem and traffic parameters on the energy-lifetime and energydelaytradeoffs using analytical and numerical results. Numericalresults show the impact of energy saving for the access network onthe introduced tradeoffs, and figure out the ways in which energycould be saved by compromising on the level of performance.

In Machine-to-Machine (M2M) networks, an energyefficient scalable medium access control (MAC) is crucial forserving massive battery-driven machine-type devices. In thispaper, we investigate the energy efficient MAC design to minimizebattery power consumption in cellular-based M2M communications.We present an energy efficient MAC protocol that notonly adapts contention and reservation-based protocols for M2Mcommunications in cellular networks, but also benefits frompartial clustering to handle the massive access problem. Then weinvestigate the energy efficiency and access capacity of contentionbasedprotocols and present an energy efficient contention-basedprotocol for intra-cluster communication of the proposed MAC,which results in huge power saving. The simulation results showthat the proposed MAC protocol outperforms the others in energysaving without sacrificing much delay or throughput. Also, thelifetimes of both individual nodes and the whole M2M networkare significantly extended.

Performance tradeoffs in resource provisioningfor mixed internet-of-things (IoT) and human-orientedcommunications(HoC) services over cellular networks are investigated.First, we present a low-complexity model of cellularconnectivity in the uplink direction in which both accessreservation and scheduled data transmission procedures areincluded. This model is employed subsequently in derivinganalytical expressions for energy efficiency, spectral efficiency,and experienced delay in data transmission of connected devicesas well as energy consumption of base stations. The derivedexpressions indicate that the choice of uplink resource provisioningstrategy introduces tradeoffs between battery lifetime forIoT communications, quality of service (QoS) for HoC, spectralefficiency and energy consumption for the access network. Then,the impacts of system and traffic parameters on the introducedtradeoffs are investigated. Performance analysis illustrates thatimproper resource provisioning for IoT traffic not only degradesQoS of high-priority services and decreases battery lifetime ofIoT devices, but also increases energy consumption of the accessnetwork. The presented analytical and simulations results figureout the ways in which spectral/energy efficiency for the accessnetwork and QoS for high-priority services could be traded toprolong battery lifetimes of connected devices by compromisingon the level of provisioned radio resources.

In this paper the uplink scheduling and transmit powercontrol is investigated to minimize the energy consumption forbattery-driven devices deployed in cellular networks. A lifetimemetric based on the accurate energy consumption model for cellularbasedmachine devices is provided and used to formulate theuplink scheduling and power control problems as network lifetimemaximization problems. Then, lifetime-aware uplink scheduling andpower control protocols which maximize the overall network lifetimeare investigated based on the different lifetime definitions. Besidesthe exact solutions, the low-complexity suboptimal solutions arepresented in this work which can achieve near optimal performancewith much lower computational complexity. The performance evaluationshows that the network lifetime is significantly extended underproposed protocols.

High energy efficiency is critical for enabling massive machine-type communications (MTC) over cellular networks. This paper is devoted to energy consumption modeling, battery lifetime analysis, lifetime-aware scheduling, and transmit power control for massive MTC over cellular networks. We consider a realistic energy consumption model for MTC and model network battery-lifetime. Analytic expressions are derived to demonstrate the impact of scheduling on both the individual and network battery lifetimes. The derived expressions are subsequently employed in the uplink scheduling and transmit power control for mixed-priority MTC traffic in order to maximize the network lifetime. Besides the main solutions, low complexity solutions with limited feedback requirement are investigated, and the results are extended to existing LIE networks. In addition, the energy efficiency, spectral efficiency, and network lifetime tradeoffs in resource provisioning and scheduling for MTC over cellular networks are investigated. The simulation results show that the proposed solutions can provide substantial network lifetime improvement and network maintenance cost reduction in comparison with the existing scheduling schemes.

Today many organizations make a great deal of content available via a web interface. For this project the main scope will be the public web of KTH Royal Institute of Technology. KTH has lots of data available online. The problem that occurs is that the people who write this content do not get feedback about what they post. The idea of this project is to change that and by giving the responsible person(s) feedback about their content.

The main goal of the project is keeping track of changes of web pages. For example, each course has its own content and information pages - which can be changed by the person(s) responsible for the course. When pages are available in two languages and changes are made to one of them the logical expectation would be that the other language has to be changed as well. However, in the current system there is no systematic way that this change occurs or that someone would be reminded when only one version changed. Similarly for other content pages, although these might not be in multiple languages it would be interesting to see how often a page is updated and to notify the responsible person(s) that a certain page has not been updated in quite some time.

A secondary goal of this project is to provide a proof of concept implementation of a tool that can automatically access web page in KTH Social (a locally developed web service) – thus enabling users to write code that can access, modify, and annotate web pages. Such a tool could be used to compute readability scores for each page and then annotate the page with this score.

The code that was implemented for this project accomplished both goals. Some suggestions are made for how this process can be improved and how alternatively this processing could be done by working directly on the databases used to produce dynamic content.

In this paper, we study the influence of video stalling on QoE. We provide QoE models that are obtained in realistic scenarios on the smartphone, and provide energy-saving approaches for smartphone by leveraging the proposed QoE models in relation to energy. Results show that approximately 5J is saved in a 3 minutes video clip with an acceptable Mean Opinion Score (MOS) level when the video frames are skipped. If the video frames are not skipped, then it is suggested to avoid freezes during a video stream as the freezes highly increase the energy waste on the smartphones.

Allgon, 'The Antenna Specialist', was a leading international design house and manufacturer of antennas for almost 60 years. The company was started in Stockholm in 1947 under the name of 'Antennspecialisten', by the Swedish engineer Torbjörn Cramner and his wife Veronica. In 1951 the company moved to Åkersberga north of Stockholm where its main facilities where located until the late 90's. During its life time the company designed and produced antennas for HF, VHF, Cellular and Microwave frequency bands, and for military, emergency, private and cellular radio systems. The company was in 2004 acquired by the US based company Powerwave but still today many of its original antenna designs are in production and many thousands of its base station antennas for mobile networks are still deployed all around the World.

Competition and lead-time pressure motivates us to find new and better ways of continuously improving the output of our work. The emphasis on improvement in both efficiency and quality has become more and more significant in daily activities. The performance of Ericsson’s AXE/APZ products during shipment test phase is one such activity and is the focus of this thesis project. One of the essential principles of shipment testing is to ensure that the test campaigns finish on time. Over the last several decades companies have spent large amounts of time and money on improving test quality and efficiency. Unfortunately, the results have not always been as good as expected. It seems that it is very difficult to improve shipment testing performance using traditional test management methods.

Motorola introduced Six Sigma in 1986 and achieved 5.4 Sigma level which help them saved 2.2 Billion dollars during the first six years. From Statistic aspect, it means only 3.4 defects per million opportunities. The Six Sigma methodology has been applied as a management philosophy focused on improving efficiency and performance during the shipment test period.

This thesis gives an introduction to the Six Sigma approach, including the concepts of Six Sigma, its history, development, and methodology. More specifically the author uses the Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, and Control (DMAIC) approach to evaluate the performance of Ericsson’s AXE/APZ Shipment Testing. This project goal was defined: Compare with the performance of 08AXE shipment test which 87% of test campaigns (2.68 sigma level) were finished on time, 3 sigma level in 09AXE shipment test which means 93%of the test campaigns will be finished on time has to be achieved. The thesis measured the 08AXE shipment test performance and analyzed the lead time of test campaigns, found the root causes such as poor documents quality from the legacy project, lack of test resources, no system impact analysis. The thesis also provided a set of proposals for improvements and control of the improved process in order to ensure sustainable improved performance results. Finally 93% test campaigns were finished on time in 09AXE and project goal was fulfilled.

Modern distributed systems are geo-distributed for reasons of increased performance, reliability, and survivability. At the heart of many such systems, e.g., the widely used Cassandra and MongoDB data stores, is an algorithm for choosing a closest set of replicas to service a client request. Suboptimal replica choices due to dynamically changing network conditions result in reduced performance as a result of increased response latency. We present GeoPerf, a tool that tries to automate the process of systematically testing the performance of replica selection algorithms for geodistributed storage systems. Our key idea is to combine symbolic execution and lightweight modeling to generate a set of inputs that can expose weaknesses in replica selection. As part of our evaluation, we analyzed network round trip times between geographically distributed Amazon EC2 regions, and showed a significant number of daily changes in nearestK replica orders. We tested Cassandra and MongoDB using our tool, and found bugs in each of these systems. Finally, we use our collected Amazon EC2 latency traces to quantify the time lost due to these bugs. For example due to the bug in Cassandra, the median wasted time for 10% of all requests is above 50 ms.

Many geo-distributed systems rely on a replica selection algorithms to communicate with the closest set of replicas. Unfortunately, the bursty nature of the Internet traffic and ever changing network conditions present a problem in identifying the best choices of replicas. Suboptimal replica choices result in increased response latency and reduced system performance. In this work we present GeoPerf, a tool that tries to automate testing of geo-distributed replica selection algorithms. We used GeoPerf to test Cassandra and MongoDB, two popular data stores, and found bugs in each of these systems.